Kim Chun-hwan, Vice President in charge of R&D Process, Newsroom Interview
Received 'Silver Tower Industrial Medal' at Last Month's R&D Expo
"TSV and MR-MUF, SK's Core Competitiveness"
"Do Not Fear Failure, Challenge and Try"
Kim Chun-hwan, Vice President in charge of Research & Development (R&D) Process at SK Hynix, emphasized in an interview with the company’s newsroom on the 2nd that the reason SK Hynix demonstrated outstanding technological competitiveness in High Bandwidth Memory (HBM) was due to the "pre-development of 'elemental technologies'." Elemental technologies are fundamental technologies necessary to implement core semiconductor processes such as design, manufacturing, packaging, and testing.
Kim Chun-hwan, Vice President in charge of Research and Development (R&D) Process at SK Hynix. Photo by SK Hynix Newsroom
Vice President Kim is an expert who has devoted 32 years to memory semiconductor research since joining the company in 1992. He is recognized as a key figure who contributed significantly to the development of TSV (Through Silicon Via) elemental technology, the core of HBM, participating from the early development stages and continuing research for 15 years to establish the foundation of the company’s HBM process. TSV is a technology that drills microscopic holes in chips to connect the upper and lower chips electrically and stack them, enabling high capacity and high bandwidth, and it is the key technology that determines HBM performance.
In recognition of these achievements, he was awarded the Silver Tower Industrial Medal as an industrial technology promotion (technology development division) contributor at the '2024 Industrial Technology R&D Comprehensive Exhibition' held at COEX, Samseong-dong, on the 27th of last month. Vice President Kim self-assessed, "This award recognizes the achievement of successfully mass-producing highly profitable high-performance products based on elemental technologies," and reflected, "I have focused on stabilizing TSV process technology and building infrastructure while dedicating myself to research and development. We also carried out mass production quality improvement activities, which ultimately led to the successful mass production of HBM. TSV, which was the starting point of all these achievements, has now become a core competitiveness of HBM along with 'MR-MUF (Mass Reflow-Molded UnderFill).'" MR-MUF refers to two combined technologies: one that melts bumps between stacked chips to connect them, and another that fills protective material between stacked chips to enhance durability and heat dissipation.
Vice President Kim continued, "HBM3E based on 1b DRAM can be seen as the culmination of advanced technology and TSV know-how, and the ultra-high-speed, low-power LPDDR5X and LPDDR5T were developed thanks to HKMG technology." He added, "In addition, NAND and SSD products developed based on R&D elemental technologies have proven world-class competitiveness in terms of cost, performance, and quality, and wafer bonding technology plays an important role in setting the direction for ultra-high-layer NAND development."
He also stressed the importance of the R&D organization’s role in the company’s success process. Vice President Kim said, "The R&D organization develops cost-competitive technologies by breaking through limits head-on with a spirit of challenge," and added, "Synergy effects were created by adding a one-team culture to this." He continued, "From defining new elemental technologies to starting technology development and stable mass production of products, the organization must unite as one throughout the entire process to achieve goals," emphasizing, "To develop elemental technologies in a timely manner, one must not fear failure but continuously challenge and try."
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